On Monday, August 30,  DC Flacks joined forces with Washington Women in Public Relations to toast the one-year anniversary of DC-area PR and communications pros meeting up, talking to strangers and sharing beverages! More than 85 folks came out to Cedar in downtown DC to celebrate, greet new faces and present the DC Flacks Perfect Attendance Sash to the one and only Joe Flood. He’s only person besides me to attend every Flacks happy hour:

Photo credit: Dave Newman/GroovySoup

View all the photos here and be sure to check out this fun video, courtesy of Vocus, our DC Flacks sponsor:

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Introducing Dallas Flacks

Congrats to my friend Rebecca for founding the new Dallas Flacks Meetup! If you know a public relations or PR pro in the Dallas area, tell’em to join the group and mark their calendars for the first happy hour on September 28.

Nashville Flacks first Meetup a Tremendous Success

If you declare it, they will come! Congrats to Jena, Mary Beth, Rob and Cindy on their first–and fabulous–Nashville Flacks happy hour! View the photos here. And if you are a Nashvegas PR pro, join the group and attend their next event on September 27.

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Nearly one year ago, I moved to D.C. declared a PR people happy hour and was shocked when a dozen folks actually showed up. Now, DC Flacks is more successful that I could have ever imagined. We are 250+ members strong, each happy hour is attended by anywhere from 25 to 60 flacks and we’ve even got a fancy-pants sponsor: Vocus!

Building on the success of DC Flacks, I’m proud to introduce Nashville Flacks, co-organized by the lovely and talented Cindy, Jena and Mary Beth. I can’t hardly wait to see what the future holds for this group!

If you’re a PR or communications pro in the Middle Tennessee region, I hope you’ll join us. Membership is free. Like DC Flacks, the group meets once a month for beverages, conversation and ranting laughs. We’ve only been an active group for two days and already have 40 members! Pretty cool.

Now, for those of you not living in D.C. or Nashvegas, you should start your own ____ Flacks chapter on Meetup.com. If you need help, tips or encouragement, just shoot me an email at Margie (at) Flackrabbit (dot) com. Read More…

In keeping with my recent streak of firsts, I created a Meetup group this evening! If you are a PR flack in the DC area, I really hope you’ll join us for happy hour on August 18 at the Chop House upstairs bar (it has its own bathroom!).

I recently accompanied Dave on two Meetup happy hours:  DC Bloggers and DC Photography. Their respective organizers have polar opposite visions for their groups:

The DC Bloggers Meetup was a blast – cool, funny people – but the gal running it has since made it clear the causal attendee isn’t her target audience.  That’s her prerogative, of course, but I just want to MEET UP with folks, not take on a part time job. (sigh) It honestly made me sad to learn folks like me aren’t welcome. Oh, well – at least I got introduced to the DCBlogs dude!

But tonight’s DC Photography Meetup, led by the fabulous Jim, ROCKED. Great turnout, sincere and talented folks – and the entire point really was simply to meet up and get to know each other. And look: the photo dudes have already posted a pic of me and my baby! I had so much fun, it inspired me to start my own for PR peeps.

Right now, the only members are me and hubbs (thanks, baby!). But even if it’s just the two of us who show up, it will still be a fantastic adventure for me, the Meetup newb.

Are you active in Meetup? Do you find them fun or beneficial? Have you ever started a one?